What to eat in Vancouver?

I don’t think anyone can deny that one of the most beautiful things about travelling is to taste all the different, new dishes. The sushi in Japan, the feijoada in Brazil, the stinky but delicious durian in Thailand. There is always at least one local dish to try. If it’s your first time in Canada or Vancouver and you don’t know which are the typical dishes, here are some you should definitely try.

And to complete the answer to your question “What to eat in Vancouver?”, a couple of directions on where to find the best food in the most important and populated city of British Columbia, although it is not the capital (as often happens in North America).

1. What to eat in Vancouver first? The “Poutine”

Definable as “Comfort food”, Poutine is a dish widespread throughout Canada and consists of chips garnished with plenty of “curd cheese” (almost curd) and “Gravy Sauce”, a typical American brown sauce, made from meat juice thickened with flour and corn starch. You can’t say it’s a light dish, but it’s perfect if you wonder what to eat in Vancouver after a long walk in one of the amazing parks of the city. At 1885 Commercial Drive you will find “Belgian Fries” that prepares it in

2. What to eat in Vancouver as a dessert? The “Nanaimo Bar”!

For gourmands like me (the “sweet tooth” as they call us in those parts) what to eat in Vancouver actually means what is the sweetest … “sweet” to eat in Vancouver! The answer is definitely ”laNanaimo bar”, a dessert made up of 3 layers: wafer crumble on the bottom, cold butter cream in the middle and, of course, a nice thick chocolate frosting on top. Of course there are many variations: with butter, gluten free, and even mint. You can find it all over Vancouver, but the way you can enjoy it until you pass out of hyperglycemia and do the so-called Nanaimo Bar Trail, a path of bars that serve it in the city that gave it its name, visited in a day starting in the morning and returning in the evening to Vancouver. An excellent opportunity to see the wonders of Nanaimo and the surrounding environment, however.

3. What to eat in Vancouver as a “main course”? Salmon!

In any city in Canada you will find the famous smoked salmon from British Columbia, souvenirs to take home in decorated cedar boxes.

Vancouver is therefore home to a great smoked salmon but you can’t help but try the “Candy Salmon Nuggets”, salmon morsels caramelized in brown sugar, salty and spicy. Certainly a very special sweet-and-sour combination, but every now and then it’s worth tasting something completely new, even if only to be able to say that it’s sh**fo with full knowledge of the facts!

Always remember that an intelligent idea (like all those in our manual “Smart Travelling – secret tricks and strategies for the modern traveller”) is to buy packaged food as a souvenir. If you opt for salmon, try to take it on the day of departure and keep it fresh. Nor do you find great and cheap salmon in the big supermarkets like “Safeway” and “No Frills”.

4. What to eat in Vancouver as a “national product”? The “maple syrup” and its derivatives!

Yes, I have already admitted that I am very greedy, but this is not the reason why I chose a dessert as my national dish. It’s not often, in fact, that a food is even reported in a national symbol. If you think about it, in fact, the flag of Canada has a maple leaf in its center: and it is from this tree you get the “maple syrup” the maple syrup, precisely, of which Canada is obviously the largest producer in the world. There are many foods in Vancouver, as indeed throughout the country, made or seasoned with maple syrup. In Granville Island, for example, you will find Edible Canada, where you can taste or buy everything that is made with maple syrup (chocolate, candies, maple flakes, sugar and so on) and of course all the varieties of “maple syrup”. Maple syrup is also a great idea for a tasty and genuine souvenir, bringing family and friends a real piece of Canada instead of a useless magnet with Vancouver written but “made in China”.

5. What to eat in Vancouver as traditional food? The “Bannock”!

If he had asked a “blogger of the past” what to eat in Vancouver, he would have had no choice but to answer “the bannock”, a dish that comes from nothing less than the indigenous peoples of Canada, also known as Canadian Aborigines.

It is a simple food similar to bread or more precisely to the American “Biscuits”, which unlike the translation with the word biscuit that is often mistakenly used, are not sweet (unfortunately for me, this time!) but tasty sandwiches slightly crispy outside and soft inside.

Although it is so good that it can be eaten alone, it is enough to make two plus two to understand that the most traditional way to enjoy this “sandwich” today is with salmon. You can ask for the famous “Salmon n’ Bannock”.

You can easily find it in the so-called “Aboriginal restaurants” distributed throughout the city or, to follow the latest trends, enjoy it as a street food (street food) buying it directly in the Food Truck (trucks selling food directly) as “Mr. Bannok”, specializing in Indigenous Cuisine, which prepares it in its many variations.

In short, you could try everything in one meal: a nice sandwich with smoked salmon “Salmon n’ Bannock”.

Be careful where you eat in Vancouver: it’s a city full of tourist traps. All visitors to Vancouver, for example, go to the Capilano Suspension Bridge, make an incredible queue and pay a dear ticket to unmount on a suspension bridge trying not to bring any Japanese heads back into their selfie. However, there is another suspended crossing, certainly not so long, but completely free and surrounded by a beautiful park called Lynn Canyon Park where you can take beautiful walks and run alone back and forth on the bridge, because outside peak hours there will be no one else but some local jogging.